Johnny Furphy targets shooting consistency and defense as he enters his sophomore Indiana season<\/p>\n
Australian wing Johnny Furphy <\/a>heads into his sophomore NBA\u00a0season with the Indiana Pacers<\/a> with a clear goal.<\/p>\n “Consistency with shooting,” he declared during the Indiana Pacers 2025 Media Day in Indianapolis today. <\/p>\n “I\u2019ve got to be able to make open shots all the time. That\u2019s the biggest thing. And then defense \u2014 I think defense is going to help me get opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n Furphy, 20, played limited minutes for the Pacers last season but was part of the roster and played in the 2025 NBA\u00a0Finals against eventual champions Oklahoma City Thunder. He announced his arrival during the 2025 Summer League in Las Vegas with arguably the greatest NBA\u00a0dunk by an Australian in history<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m feeling more comfortable in my body, being able to absorb contact and use my body a little bit better,” Furphy said. <\/p>\n “I\u2019m excited for this year. It\u2019s nice knowing what to expect going into my second year, so I feel more comfortable.\u201d\u200d<\/p>\n Furphy played in 50 games during his rookie year, averaging 2.1 points, 1.4 rebounds, and 0.4 assists in 7.6 minutes per game.<\/p>\n He’s one of an expected 18 Australian men’s basketballers \u2014 when Ben Simmons<\/a> and Patty Mills<\/a> sign somewhere via free agency \u2014 to play in the NBA in 2025-26 as well as being one of nine international stars competing in the 2025 NBA Finals.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s big,” he said.<\/p>\n “I think it\u2019s pretty cool to be a part of it. It\u2019s the most international players we\u2019ve ever had in the league right now, so it\u2019s cool to be part of it. <\/p>\n “I think it\u2019s just going to keep growing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Johnny Furphy targets shooting consistency and defense as he enters his sophomore Indiana season Australian wing Johnny Furphy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":178785,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-178784","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178784"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178784\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}